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<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/26701543">Impervious Swamps</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/StarGzer/pseuds/StarGzer'>StarGzer</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>Lancer (TV)</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>Completed</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2020-09-28</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2020-09-28</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-05-06 05:47:30</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>General Audiences</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>1</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>3,251</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/26701543</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/StarGzer/pseuds/StarGzer</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p>A tetchy Scott and Johnny in the aftermath of CAWH, with emotions swirling high. Thanks to Kali for the beta.</p>
<p>Hope and the future for me are not in lawns and cultivated fields, not in towns and cities, but in the impervious and quaking swamps. (Henry David Thoreau, from "Walking")</p>
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Comments:</b></td><td>2</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>7</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>Impervious Swamps</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>Stumbling back into the oak's trunk, Johnny slid down rough bark to the ground. Lifted two searching fingers to his chin, and waggled it a little to assess the damage then shook out his fist, glancing at freshly opened knuckles.</p>
<p>"Are we done?" he asked through a lip the size of his thumb.</p>
<p>Groaning, Scott rose to a crouch, rolling first one shoulder then the next. He clambered to a thick tree root, sat panting at the darkening clouds while he passed the back of his hand under his nose. Perused the smear of blood across the skin, then saw something glittering in the dirt.</p>
<p>His voice hitched as he tried to catch his breath. "Is that yours? I didn't know you had a gold tooth."</p>
<p>Johnny cocked his jaw, pushed his tongue around to count teeth until it hit the back of his mouth. "Not anymore." He sniffed. "Cost me a bundle, too."</p>
<p>Shifting, Scott turned his wrecked face to Johnny. "This is idiotic."</p>
<p>Johnny jacked up both knees, leaned forward and snorted. Spat a blood-streaked plug between his boots. He gazed across the draw to where the horses had stopped cropping grass long enough to enjoy the show, and whistled low into the still air of countryside. Answering thunder rumbled in the distance and a few spits of rain wet the grass.</p>
<p>"Scott, next time, you get the calf."</p>
<p>
  <em>Earlier:</em>
</p>
<p>If he had to pinpoint a time when it all started, Scott would be hard pressed to say—perhaps a few weeks ago. But an epiphany came as he cut through the bevy of horses in the corral on his way from the barn: <em>Johnny was annoying.</em></p>
<p>It felt good, to have that dawn on him.</p>
<p>He would've thrown his fist into the face of anyone who suggested there'd be benefits to Johnny leaving Lancer and for a while, it seemed to be a real enough threat. Two weeks since his brother and Murdoch had ridden together in search of wild horses—an event so out of the ordinary it was surprising frogs didn't fall from the sky—and Scott's pendulum still swung between an acute sense of relief and a heady foreboding.</p>
<p>Johnny was staying. Cue the harps and roses.</p>
<p>But since he wasn't on a track to Hell with Wes, Johnny was raising it. Scott was rediscovering his brother was at his most insufferable when he was in a good mood. For the last fourteen days, Johnny had been foaming up horses on a reckless, care-free bent in fairly consistent style. He managed to get everything done that Murdoch threw at him, yet maintained a certain out-of-character bonhomie.</p>
<p>Maybe that's what happened after a tipping point was breeched, when both father and son tiptoed back from the precipice, still alive to talk about it. Or they would have talked, if the principle players had been anyone else besides Johnny and Murdoch.</p>
<p>So, it was no great shock to find his brother missing from the corral. When he glanced around, a bored-looking Frank pointed his finger at the bunkhouse door.</p>
<p>He looked up in time to hear raucous laughter and Johnny's voice rising above it all, then the sound of glass breaking.</p>
<p>Scott's feet stuttered. He leapt towards the doorway, ran right into a solidly swung punch on the other side.</p>
<p>
  <em>Of all the stupid things…</em>
</p>
<p>~o~o~o~</p>
<p>The fourth time he said it, Scott pitched a pawn at his head.</p>
<p>Johnny caught it in mid-flight and choked he was laughing so hard. "Mad Manuela from Manteca!" he shouted around a huge smile. Twirled the hand-carved game piece in his hand and slapped it down to accompany the rest of Scott's hard-lost booty.</p>
<p>"It's not that funny," he muttered, slouching in his chair plotting out his next strategic move, because while the first two had missed their mark, he was bound for a change in luck.</p>
<p>"Shoulda gone for the checkers. Would've been less work," Johnny returned, eyes flicking from board to fireplace to Scott's Queen. His lips were pulled back, mouth hung slightly open, about to make the `em' sound.</p>
<p>Scott spotted his Thoreau, spine split over the couch arm. It was opened to a favorite chapter and not for the first time he wondered how he got suckered—and that was the word for it—into this catastrophe of a chess game. Because if he didn't get away from his brother right now, he was going to…concede the game. Hoisting the white flag was better than hearing about Mad Manuela from Manteca, over and over again.</p>
<p>The words already danced in his head: the delicate `m's', the elongated `l's' and the slightly absurd, sharp `eca' clinging to each new thought. Even Thoreau at his most philosophical couldn't stem the tide of images Mad Manuela invoked.</p>
<p>He was sunk.</p>
<p>~o~O~o~</p>
<p>He'd lost him. Somewhere between the advertisement of land for sale in Kansas and a boldly printed note exhorting a sale for <em>Arundels' New Tinted Spectacles</em>, Scott had lost him. The wrens chirping outside the mercantile were more attentive.</p>
<p>"Johnny?"</p>
<p>"What?"</p>
<p>"Care to repeat what I just said?"</p>
<p>Johnny pried his attention from the nearby shelves, gazed at Scott blankly. "Huh?"</p>
<p>"You're not even looking at this."</p>
<p>"No, I am. Keep going."</p>
<p>"So, a million acres of land is being offered for sale by the Burlington and Missouri Railroad Company on a ten year credit. Only six percent interest."</p>
<p>"No shit," mused Johnny, eyes elsewhere.</p>
<p>"The Indian Colonization Society has already sent over seventy families to this peaceful garden spot in Kansas. Purchasers are guaranteed full protection from the tribes living in the locality, for the first two months after buying."</p>
<p>That got Johnny's focus snapped well and truly back on him. "Protection?"</p>
<p>"So it says. And here's another advertisement from Independence, Kansas. This arms company has over fourteen hundred second hand six-shooters and one thousand Winchester rifles for sale." He raised an eyebrow. "It appears to me the more recent natives of Kansas are a bit nervous. What do you suppose those seventy families managed a stop at Independence before venturing westward to the garden spot?"</p>
<p>Johnny looked nonplussed. "Can't be too peaceful of a spot with all that firepower."</p>
<p>Scott huffed out a laugh. Johnny was staring across the mercantile again, but Scott let it go. At least he was halfway engaged.</p>
<p>"It's the word `colonization'. Plenty of room there for offense, depending on your point of view."</p>
<p>Johnny waved a distracted hand over the newspaper in front of them. "Okay, so what else do we have to get here?"</p>
<p>Clasping his hands together in front of his belt, Scott leaned forward. "The goods have already been ordered. We've been done for a while."</p>
<p>"Oh." Johnny stared dumbly at the black print. His face contorted in disgust. "Are you blind? How can you not see her?" He hissed and hooked a thumb towards the back of the store. "Don't ask me to read a newspaper when she's not twenty feet away."</p>
<p>Scott sighed. He wasn't blind, he had urges, and yes, he'd seen her. Long dark hair was piled up in some sort of twisty intricate fashion, the mechanics of which would surely have been taught from childhood to get it just so. Yellow checked gingham pulled tight across all the important places. She bent over to finger a few bright knickknacks on a lower shelf, hiking up her long skirt in the process to show a delicate-turned ankle enclosed in a soft kid boot. It was a casual display of femininity that broadcast availability. She had a sort of feline sleekness about her, a woman of class that was far more Scott's style than Johnny's. So yes, oh yes, he'd seen her.</p>
<p>He blinked. "Are you going to be long?"</p>
<p>Johnny snorted. "No." He gave the woman a lingering look, then turned his attention back to the counter. He shuffled the newspaper, brow creasing in concentration and cleared his throat. "Okay, what else?"</p>
<p>Scott raised his eyebrows. "That's it? You're letting her go?"</p>
<p>Johnny managed to look affronted. "What? I'm listening."</p>
<p>"Sure you are."</p>
<p>Johnny jerked a thumb over his shoulder. "Scott, that lady over there? That takes time." He looked briefly shattered. "I don't have that kind of time."</p>
<p>"Since when?"</p>
<p>"I never figured on getting any horses when I rode out with Murdoch, but since finding that herd, it's the only thing going. They all need tending in some way. Coupled with chores, there goes my time." He gave Scott a flash of white teeth and tapped on the counter. "See? I can do two things at once. Let's get back to this paper."</p>
<p>But he couldn't. Two minutes later, the woman was still paying inordinate attention to the figurines in careful view of Johnny's wandering eye.</p>
<p>Scott snapped his fingers. "My God, just talk to her. Ask her to the dance on Saturday."</p>
<p>Johnny shuffled his feet, tugged unabashedly at the buttons of his trousers, head bobbing like it was on two-foot swells. "No, no, it'll be all right."</p>
<p>Scott turned to scoop up the newspaper. "Then let's go, Murdoch will be waiting dinner." But he was talking to himself, Johnny had changed his mind and stalked to the end of the shelves, hovering in place beside the lady like a dog on scent. <em>Gone.</em></p>
<p>~o~O~o~</p>
<p>Scott had already gulped down two cups of Walt's coffee at the barn while waiting. Was wishing for a third by the time Johnny turned up, lips one solid thin line. It was Sunday, which fell after Saturday, ergo falling after the dance, it didn't take too much intelligence to figure out why his brother was piqued. He held Barranca's reins out to Johnny, and they made their way out to the pasture.</p>
<p>There was nothing so unusual about a long pause, not where his brother was concerned, but actual silence was different. It was impressive really, the impromptu finger tapping Johnny was capable of against the pommel of his saddle. But after the maddening stint with Wes and the stallion, and the most recent bunkhouse fight, Scott had about enough of watching Johnny's performances.</p>
<p>"Do you have to do that?"</p>
<p>The fingers came to an abrupt halt. "Is it bothering you?"</p>
<p>"I would say it's annoying."</p>
<p>Johnny narrowed his eyes.</p>
<p>Scott blew out a breath. "Let's just get this done, all right?"</p>
<p>"Sorry it's such a chore, riding with me." There was a touch of wounded indignation in Johnny's rebuttal.</p>
<p>Scott knew he was being irritable. Cleaning up the creek that ran through the pasture only heralded being damp and dirty for the rest of the afternoon, which was certainly nothing new. It was Wes and the Strykers, catalysts of sorts, because now there was something more offensive with just about everything since they had crossed Lancer's doorstep. Including his brother.</p>
<p>Run aground—stranded—his equilibrium had shifted with the realization that Johnny had every intention of leaving with Wes.</p>
<p>He put his mind to the trail instead, hunkered down in the saddle and concentrated on keeping his mouth shut. A breeze had picked up, bringing with it a thin sheen of ozone. Rain. Perfect.</p>
<p>"How did the dance go?" he asked when the silence between them stretched and threatened frost. It seemed to strike a particularly raw nerve as Johnny reined up.</p>
<p>"What are you so mad about, anyway?"</p>
<p>Scott straightened. "What? I'm not mad."</p>
<p>"Yeah, you are. You've been all scratchy since…" Johnny trailed off with a chuckle. "Oh."</p>
<p>"Since when?" He shrugged like he didn't know.</p>
<p>Johnny rubbed his eye with the flat of his fingers. "Since Murdoch and me had that little tussle."</p>
<p>"And that's funny to you, is it?"</p>
<p>"I'm sorry, but you should have seen the look on your face back then. I thought you were gonna kill him. Us. Whatever." Johnny's lips thinned out. "The Strykers were in the wrong and you know it."</p>
<p>"Yes, and yet I'm the Lancer who gets shot. Next time you want to run away, leave me out of it."</p>
<p>"Fine. Next time, stay out of it. No one asked you to come to the saloon anyway." Johnny gathered reins into one hand. "With any luck, the creek won't take too long." He stared at Scott, who held it tight, and nothing more was said.</p>
<p>The distinct cry of a calf caught their attention. Scott stood in the stirrups, twisted around. "I can't see anything. Can you?"</p>
<p>Johnny pointed to a shady draw. "It's coming from over there."</p>
<p>They rode closer and peered over the embankment. There it was, one of the white-faced calves missing from the week's tally, bawling in earnest now, hidden amongst the brambles. Johnny sighed, an echo of his own sentiment, even as he dismounted and tipped over the edge to get the calf.</p>
<p>Scott was still mounted when he saw the grass slither every which way, right near Johnny's foot.</p>
<p>~o~O~o~</p>
<p>"How could you not have seen it?" Scott worked a handkerchief out of his pocket. "You were standing almost on top of it."</p>
<p>"Maybe that's why I didn't see it." Johnny poked around the long bloody stripe on his forearm. "Why didn't you just tell me the snake was there instead of shoving me?"</p>
<p>Scott watched the calf trot off without a care in the world. "It's a scratch. You fell and got a scratch."</p>
<p>"Pushed. Pretty hard, too."</p>
<p>Just a hint of accusation, but there it was all the same. "Say it plain, brother."</p>
<p>"You went to that fancy school, figure it out."</p>
<p>Something inside that had been set to simmer bubbled to the top. For two grown men, having both seen their way in the world, they could be perfectly foolish. That's what he was thinking when he dropped the handkerchief and swung.</p>
<p>Johnny staggered to the side, clutching his jaw. "You'd better think about what you're doing before trying that again—<em>Boston</em>."</p>
<p>"You arrogant bastard."</p>
<p>Blinking, Johnny's expression went hard. "No, I think that little mystery was solved when the old man invited us in for drinks."</p>
<p>Circling, knuckles bunched and hard, Scott lunged. Johnny dodged, sent his fist out, skimming Scott's chin with enough force his head bounced back.</p>
<p>Scott blocked a wild swing and caught his brother by the wrist; twisted his forearm a half-turn, shoved him back the way he came.</p>
<p>Johnny pointed a warning. "What the hell is wrong with you?"</p>
<p>"Me? Try taking a look in the mirror."</p>
<p>"That's it." Johnny beckoned him forward.</p>
<p>A left hook whistled past his cheek, but the upper cut that followed hit dead center, drove him to his knees.</p>
<p>It went from a measure of genteelness to an ugly brawl in less time than Scott needed to pull on his boots in the morning. They spent the next few minutes roughing up the grass and each other in a tangled knot of <em>eyegougingearpullingkneetotheballs </em>before Scott lucked into an opening. Sent a haymaker right into it.</p>
<p>Johnny collapsed on top of him in a confusing mix of limbs, sweat and blood.</p>
<p>Chest heaving, Scott pushed at his brother's sprawled body. "Why do you have to…? Can't you just…?" His voice was ragged.</p>
<p>
  <em>What did he expect Johnny to do?</em>
</p>
<p>It shouldn't have mattered that Johnny made the decision to leave. Not anymore. And he was pretty sure those thoughts had never crossed his mind before. But he remembered how Johnny was set on leaving; trying to make sure everything was in place, as if he'd never been there. Without warning, the Pardee mess came to mind, when Johnny had made another choice. Once you were blindsided, it wasn't supposed to happen twice.</p>
<p>He shifted a little, loosening his grip a fraction. The legs across his chest twitched up and before he knew it, Johnny had kicked free, his face gullied with exasperation and anger.</p>
<p>Scott started to collect himself. The sparks of his own anger sputtered, finally died. He prodded his cheek carefully, felt the lump already forming. It was eerily quiet once they had stopped and when he spoke it was too loud. "This is idiotic."</p>
<p>He slid a glance to Johnny, who sat there with a bewildered look on his face.</p>
<p>The hint of betrayal still niggled at him. And Scott knew what that felt like that, no matter who did it: brother or comrade. But he shut the door to that thought quickly. He'd had enough to last a lifetime. "I want you to know I didn't mean it."</p>
<p>Johnny dipped his head. "I think I understand."</p>
<p>He frowned.</p>
<p>"I've been getting on your nerves lately. It's okay."</p>
<p>"What?"</p>
<p>"It's different now that I'm staying."</p>
<p>Scott felt the blood drain from his face. "Oh, no. It's not like that."</p>
<p>Johnny shook his head. "No, I don't think that. It's just been a helluva few months trying to get used to things. And then Wes came along and I figured—shit—I'm not ready for ranching." He spit out an incredulous laugh. "The thing with Wes and Murdoch, well, that was a scrabble. I didn't know how it was gonna play out. Had my share of cold sweats over it." He looked up. "And I know you've been part of it, from the start. Any way you look at it, this last month's been a real pistol."</p>
<p>Scott felt his throat clamp shut. Couldn't distinguish exactly why, or the source. Didn't know if it was relief or more anger. He wondered if maybe it was everything—every damned thing since Johnny surprised him by shaking hands goodbye on the portico.</p>
<p>And he was about to squash it down again. But it didn't have to be such a tight and desperate act anymore. There was time. To learn. To be happy or sad or the billions of things in between. There was time to make mistakes and fix things. Scott nodded, wasn't sure his voice would allow anything else.</p>
<p>"It's different," Johnny repeated. "I don't know exactly where I thought I was gonna be right now, but it sure as hell wasn't sitting on Lancer ground."</p>
<p>Johnny scrubbed his nails against the stubble beneath his jaw. "I know I've been a pain in the ass the last couple of weeks."</p>
<p>Scott started to shake his head, nodded instead. "Partly. But you've been happy, more so than I've ever seen you." He waved a hand. "Far be it from me, Johnny. I was out of line."</p>
<p>Johnny threw Scott a half-smile, ran his hand up and down the back of his head. "Don't know what's going on lately. I either want to smile, or beat up someone, and I don't have a clue which. I do know I don't like getting tossed over at socials."</p>
<p>He barked out a laugh, opened up his lip again. "Ow," he winced. "Maybe you should have asked her to dinner instead. You don't like to dance, right?"</p>
<p>"I like dancing just fine," Johnny muttered and Scott realized that he honestly didn't know how Johnny felt about dancing, among other things.</p>
<p>Weather claimed the rest of the conversation, the tension leaching into the black clouds. It was too soothing of a rain for any recriminations or regrets and Scott felt too sore for them in any case.</p>
<p>Johnny angled his face away. "Are we gonna make it?"</p>
<p>Looking at his brother, Scott felt the tug of a smile curl his bruised mouth. "Yeah," he nodded. "I think so."</p>
<p>The End</p>
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